51黑料

ST. LOUIS 鈥� A teen who was hit and killed by a car last weekend was visiting 51黑料 to attend the "No Kings" anti-Trump protests downtown, his family said Tuesday.

Daniel "Dee Dee" Stahl, 16, was walking with his friend and his friend's parents a little after 1 a.m. Sunday when a fight broke out in the 1500 block of Washington Avenue and a car drove onto the sidewalk, its passenger shooting a gun at the same time, police said. The car hit and killed Daniel.

Daniel's aunt, Chrystal Shaul, said on Tuesday that Daniel lived in Springfield, Missouri, with his mom and two of his four siblings. He was the youngest of five.

"It鈥檚 so hard to describe him because we still want him to be here," Shaul told the Post-Dispatch. "The main thing that we want coming from all of this is that he was an innocent kid in all of this. This should have never happened to him. He did not deserve this."

His friend's mom was the 29-year-old woman who police said was hit by the car 鈥� and shot in the same incident 鈥� but survived, Shaul said.聽

City officials on Tuesday denounced the violence.

"This was yet another senseless act of violence that has no place in our community," police spokesman Mitch McCoy said. "And we are going to do everything we can to investigate and hold individuals accountable. We grieve with Daniel's family."

Mayor Cara Spencer said late Tuesday she had been briefed on the incident and lamented the situation. 鈥淚t鈥檚 tragic,鈥� she said.

51黑料 has been roiled by multiple high-profile visitor deaths in recent years.

In February 2023, Janae Edmondson, 17, was in town from Tennessee for a volleyball tournament when a driver sped out of a side street, hitting another car. One of the cars careened into the teen, pinning her between two, and the impact severed her legs. In February, her family settled a lawsuit with the city for $450,000. The driver who caused the crash, Daniel Riley, 22 then, was sentenced to 19 years in prison.

A year later, mother Laticha Bracero, 42, and her daughter Alyssa Cordova, 21, were visiting here from Chicago for a Drake concert when a driver sped through red lights near downtown and crashed into them, killing them both. Monte Henderson, 22, was charged with two counts each of involuntary manslaughter and armed criminal action. He鈥檚 scheduled to stand trial next month.

On Saturday, hours before Daniel's death, police were called to the 1500 block of Washington.

An online flyer advertised 51黑料 rapper Sexyy Red and actor and comedian Druski holding auditions at 4 p.m. at the Ely Walker lofts, a troubled condo building controlled by controversial landlords Vic Alston and Sid Chakraverty.聽

In 2022, a 16-year-old was shot inside a lobby of the same building. The city threatened to designate the building a 鈥減ublic nuisance鈥� and place it in receivership unless security improved.聽

On Saturday afternoon, police got reports of a large group of people gathered at the lofts, blocking the street. "We attempted to disperse as many people as we could," said McCoy, the police spokesman.

Then, hours later, just before 1:20 a.m., police said they received multiple calls for fights and shots fired at the same location.

Police said a crowd was there for an "unsanctioned rooftop loft party."

People were downstairs in the entryway letting individuals in and out of the building, McCoy said. At some point, an argument broke out on whether to allow in some people who were armed.

The fight spilled from the sidewalk into the street, McCoy said, and both groups fired shots.

Then a burgundy car drove onto the sidewalk, with the passenger of the vehicle firing shots.

That car hit Daniel and a woman, then drove off, police said. The woman was also shot.

On Monday, authorities said 26-year-old George McDonald III was the driver of the car, and charged him with leaving the scene of a fatal accident. He was in custody Tuesday without bond.

Eight hours before McDonald was booked into jail, he posted on Facebook that he had been jumped and was glad that he and a friend were OK. He said his car was shot at.

A video circulating online shows parts of a fight on the sidewalk outside the lofts. It shows about a dozen youths ganging up on a man and woman in front of the loft building. A few pull both to the ground, pull the man by his shirt and punch and stomp on his head.

Shaul said police told Daniel's family that Daniel was not armed and had not been involved in the fight that broke out before he was hit. McCoy on Tuesday called Daniel an "innocent bystander."

McCoy said police were still investigating "the exact role" of the 29-year-old woman 鈥� Daniel's friend's mother, Shaul said 鈥� also hit by the car.

Shaul said on Tuesday that Daniel sometimes came to 51黑料 with his friend to visit the city. The friend's family had lived here, she said.

Daniel had found some trouble in his teen years, she said, and had been sent to juvenile detention a few times, but he'd hit a turning point recently.

"He had completely changed his life around," Shaul said. "He was a really good kid. He had such a bright smile. He was always joking with people, always laughing and always smiling."

Daniel had taken to mowing yards to make money recently, she said.

Shaul has started a GoFundMe to pay for funeral expenses and said the family planned on having a balloon release in Springfield on Tuesday night.

"We don鈥檛 even get to watch him graduate," she said.

Austin Huguelet and Mark Schlinkmann of the Post-Dispatch contributed to this report.